At first the winglets were white but later the
Flitestar emblem was applied in order to make them more visible to
drivers of ground support equipment. Winglets being relatively new
to the industry and Flitestar being the first user of the A320 in
Africa.

Flitestar Airbus A320
ZS-NZP

Cape Town - International (D.F.
Malan) Early 1990sPhotograph: Cornelius
Saayman

Flitestar Airbus A320
ZS-NZR

Cape Town - International (D.F.
Malan) Early 1990sPhotograph:
Cornelius Saayman

Flitestar Airbus A320
ZS-NZS

Cape Town - International (D.F.
Malan) Early 1990sPhotograph: Cornelius
Saayman

The only aircraft actually owned by Flitestar
were two ATR-72s bought from Anglo-American and they differed from
the normal ATR-72 by having a forward cargo hold which Anglo
required.

Flitestar

By
Paul Dubois

DUE to the political scene in South Africa
with sanctions and a siege mentality, the South African skies remained a
government affair for many years. Whatever the state owned airline wanted
became law.

So much so that
SAA maintained an office within the Department of Civil
Aviation.

This
monopoly held by SAA was pretty much reflected by the attitude of their
staff which displayed little customer care. From the late eighties things
began to change and by 1991 the SA government passed legislation
deregulating the domestic air service.

Trek
Airways which was a pioneer in air travel and was operating
internationally as Luxavia, took up the challenge on 16 October 1991.
Using four brand new A320s leased from GPA (Guinness Peat Aviation), they
became the first airline to directly challenge SAA. - starting with
JNB-CPT and JNB-DUR schedules.

The
aircraft were:

ZS-NZP
“Polaris”

ZS-NZR
“Rigel”

ZS-NZS
“Sirius”

ZS-NZT “Taurus”

Trek
Airways had done their homework and knew what the travelling public
needed. At first they aimed for the Business market but later toned this
down a bit.

The
emphasis was on customer care and superior onboard service. The Captain
even greeted passengers at the aircraft door when boarding! The public
soon loved Flitestar and dare I say it, so did the frontline staff at SAA
who suddenly had a challenge! The SAA staff found a new pride in their
company and enjoyed competing with Flitestar.

Things
became alive at Jan Smuts Airport and this became a good place to be, no
matter which company you worked for. Customers suddenly had staff
competing for their business. It was a win, win situation for
all.

Flitestar
started gaining in popularity, so much so that SAA was forced to withdraw
the A300 from regular service, only returning once Flitestar ceased
operating.

Flitestar
took 25% of the domestic market and were carrying loads of 63%.
Unfortunately due to the nature of the beast, SAA still controlled many
things and chose to embark on a campaign of dirty
tricks.

·Flitestar
used the same ticketing system (SAFARI) and SAA started making Flitestar
flights appear full in the system so that agents booked PAX on SAA
instead.

·SAA
aircraft tried to delay Flitestar departures by blocking Flitestar
aircraft on push-back. Air Traffic Control always gave SAA
preference.

·Luxavia’s
B747 was leased from SAA and the A320 maintenance was done by SAA and
these costs began to rocket.

·SAA
helped their “token” opposition Comair to acquire B737s for next to
nothing.

·SAA increased its commissions to travel agents and
extended its frequent flyer programme to its domestic
services.

During
December 1993 rumours within Flitestar indicated that two A320s would go
back to GPA and I saw a fax about spares held by Flitestar being
reduced.

It
was all very confusing since Flitestar had employed more staff and talks
had begun on replacing the A320 Bahrain service with a B767 and also using
this aircraft to start a service to the Seychelles and even to replace the
B747 service to Luxemburg.

On
Monday 11th April 1994 Flitestar and Luxavia announced that they would
cease operations that very day. No talk of liquidation, just the ending of
all operations bar the ATR-72 operations which were planned as a feeder
operation for SAA. This carried on for a very brief period until they
ceased operations to make way for SA Express.

SAA
had paid in excess of R90 million to Trek Airways shareholders,
Rentmeester Beleggings, SAFREN and the de Moelenaer family to cease
operating “any” airline service in competition with SAA for five
years.

Thus even SAFAIR had to shut down the cargo operation
returning two BAe 146 aircraft to GPA.

SAA honoured all the
outstanding tickets as part of the agreement but nothing was done for the
thousand staff members who were unemployed.

SAFAIR BAe
146

I will always remember the final A320 flight to JNB
when Captain Rautenbach requested and was given permission to do a final
fly by. He responded to the tower calling himself the “Fading star” as he
switched off the light illuminating the tail.

As the passengers
disembarked with their “booty” of glasses and bottles of wine etc rattling
away in their bags, everyone was in tears, crew, passengers, SAA engineers
etc.

A
truly sad day for SA aviation and one that I believe will firmly bite SA
in the butt one day!